


murine

by glukupikron



Category: Metalocalypse (Cartoon)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-02
Updated: 2020-10-02
Packaged: 2021-03-07 17:01:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,664
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26761060
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/glukupikron/pseuds/glukupikron
Summary: “Well, we can’ts just leaves him there,” Toki protests, and wipes the sweat off his forehead with the back of his hand, knocking his baseball cap “disguise” askew.Magnus scoffs. “It’s a rat, Toki. There’s about a billion of them in New York City alone.”“Yeah, but looks at him.  He ams small, just a baby.”---For Kloktober Day 1: Being a dick or being a dude. (Magnus can be both. It’s a fine line, though.)
Relationships: Magnus Hammersmith & Toki Wartooth
Comments: 8
Kudos: 19





	murine

**Author's Note:**

> completely forgot that kloktober started today, so here's my (terribly rushed) first-day prompt fill.
> 
> (everyone's doing all these cute & fun prompt fills and i'm over here like "i can only write sad bad things." i'm sorry!)
> 
> content warnings: animal death, brief mention of animal cruelty

“Well, we can’ts just leaves him there,” Toki protests, and wipes the sweat off his forehead with the back of his hand, knocking his baseball cap “disguise” askew.

Magnus scoffs. “It’s a rat, Toki. There’s about a billion of them in New York City alone.”

“Yeah, but looks at him. He ams _small_ , just a baby.”

The creature is a pitiful sight, its little sides heaving. Underneath it is a small wet patch, and Magnus suspects it’s soiled itself. The kindest thing to do would probably be to throw it in a dumpster, he thinks.

But Toki’s determined that this is now his responsibility, and therefore by extension Magnus’, and he’s darting off to get a styrofoam container and a small cardboard box from a hot dog stand halfway down the block, leaving Magnus to watch this rat struggling to breathe on the sidewalk.

“We ams taking him to the vet,” Toki declares, and scoops the rat up, using the container like an unwieldy pair of tongs.

“Why’s this one so special?” Magnus asks as they’re getting into the car. “Didn’t you get rats in your grain silos or whatever? On that farm you lived on? You schlep those guys down the mountain to the vet’s office every time one of the barn cats got its fangs into one?”

“Nos. My dads would puts them in a sacks, drown them in the river. Sometimes he makes me does it.” Toki’s got a faraway look in his eyes, and Magnus thinks, yeah, that could probably mess up a kid. Sure gave him a weird guilt complex too, if he’s going this far to save this one.

“Sounds awful,” Magnus says, mustering what little sympathy he can, and gives Toki what he hopes comes off as a consoling pat on the shoulder. Toki looks back at him with soggy eyes, and Magnus sighs.

“Let’s get to the vet, then,” he says.

*****

“We don’t do exotics here,” the nurse says apologetically. She reaches out to stroke the rat’s fur. “Is he your pet?”

“Nos, just found him on the street. Outside the music store.”

Magnus wants to laugh at how quickly she yanks her hand away.

She gives them the name of another veterinary clinic and then they’re on the road again, Toki murmuring quietly to the rat in his lap, and Magnus can’t believe how badly the day’s been derailed.

He’s not even sure if Toki remembers he’s there, caught up as he is in the tiny drama unfolding in this cardboard container, which doesn’t bode super well for the whole “befriend Toki for clout with a cannibalistic murderer” plan. At least he’s still got dinner to look forward to, on Dethklok’s dime, even if it’s just something cheap. Toki had mentioned Olive Garden, and, well, Magnus won’t say no to free food.

Magnus decides to leave Toki to his new pet and amuse himself by testing out roughly a dozen different buttons in the DethCar’s interior. The first few are obvious--volume up, volume down, page the driver. And then there are others with symbols that he’s not really sure of, including one that appears to be a crude rendition of a semi-automatic rifle.

He presses it. A small hologram pops up at eye level: “Deploy DethCar Defense System Y/N?”

“Huh,” he says, and the urge to tap it once more to see what happens is about to win over when the intercom crackles.

“Is everything all right, my lord? We just received a defense system activation notice.”

Before Toki can answer, Magnus presses the intercom button. “Sorry, man, everything’s cool. Hit the wrong thing. My bad.”

“Very good, sir,” the klokateer says, and the driver must press something up front, because the confirmation screen disappears.

 _Sir_ , Magnus thinks. He could get used to that. Or _my lord_. Just another thing Dethklok had cheated him out of: _Respect._

The car pulls into the parking lot, neatly clipping a medical waste bag and sending its contents smearing across the sidewalk, and Magnus is reminded of that dank basement where the Revengencers hold their “gatherings,” the reek of blood and ground bone and the filth that smears every available surface.

*****

The veterinary office smells of animals, a faint antiseptic odor underlaid with urine and the powdery plastic scent of disposable gloves.

“Poor dear,” the vet says. She doesn’t seem terribly concerned about touching the rat, and palpates it gently with gloved hands. “He’s young. I’d guess only a couple months old. You said you found him outside?”

“Yeahs, outside the musics store.”

“Probably got into rat poison.” She pulls her gloves off and writes something on her clipboard. “Cost effective, so a lot of businesses use it, but cruel. It’s a slow death.”

The rat lays, unmoving except for its fluttery breaths, on a small towel on the examination table.

“Cans you help him?”

“The kindest thing to do would probably be to euthanize him. Once they’ve ingested the poison, there’s not much we can do for them. I’m sorry, dear,” she says, and her brow is furrowed in sympathy.

“Oh,” Toki says, and looks at his hands.

“You gonna charge us for it?” Magnus cuts in, and the vet turns to face him.

“Medical supplies aren’t free, unfortunately.”

“Yeah, but c’mon. We’re helping this thing outta the goodness of our hearts. And look at the kid.” He gestures to Toki. “He’s devastated.”

“I pays,” Toki says. His voice is wavery but decisive. “Puts it on my card.”

“What about dinner?” Magnus protests once she’s taken the rat and left. He knows Charles limits the band’s spending, and Toki had said something about having “just enough for some Olives Garden” after he’d bought up what seemed like half the store. (“Don’ts really _needs_ another guitar, but this ones am pretty cool! Gots a dragon on it!”)

But that’s the wrong thing to say, because Toki’s giving him a look like he can’t believe Magnus could be concerned about food at a time like this.

“Whats about it?”

If Magnus had known this was going to be what he was wasting his time on, he would have skipped out. He has projects he could be working on, he wants to say--things that don’t involve doting on dying rats Toki’s found in the middle of the sidewalk.

But starting an argument risks falling out of Toki’s good graces, and by extension, the rest of Dethklok’s. He can’t have that. Not while the plan is being set into motion. They still need time, the Assassin had told him, and Magnus had conceded. He could play best friends with Toki for as long as he needed. The perks weren’t bad either: the free food and expensive gifts Toki likes to share with him. He’d taken the receipt and returned the last guitar Toki had bought him, and that had paid his rent for almost two months.

So Magnus shrugs, and says, “Never mind,” and he still can’t quite believe how torn up Toki’s getting over a _rat_. It’s an odd mixture of selfish and selfless this kid has, and Magnus, despite his attempts to remain detached, finds it kind of fascinating.

Most of Magnus’ good will evaporates at the front counter, though. Toki’s card gets declined, and Magnus _really_ can’t believe his fuckin’ luck. Dinner’s officially off the table, literally and figuratively, and now he’s gonna have to cough up seventy-three dollars to euthanize an animal that was already as good as dead.

But Toki fixes Magnus with those sad, wet eyes again, and he grudgingly pulls out his wallet.

*****

They drive to a park, Toki holding the small plastic box, the size of a paperback book, that they’d given him at the vet’s office. Toki bids the Klokateers to wait in the car, and they do, leaving him and Magnus to trudge through the woods alone. Magnus carries a small garden trowel (that he’d also paid for, bringing the amount Toki owes him up to almost ninety dollars). Toki clutches the little rat corpse in its box, and the trees eventually swallow them up, obscuring the view of the car.

The realization bludgeons him in the chest. Toki is a fool. A crybaby, and too trusting by quite a lot more than half, and Magnus could knife him in the gut right here without a single witness. He really has no idea. It’s a powerful feeling, but it’s laced, peculiarly, with pity.

Toki takes the garden trowel from Magnus and digs a shallow hole. It’s not going to be deep enough to prevent something from digging the corpse up, but Magnus figures Toki doesn’t need to worry himself about that, and the sooner they can get this over with, the better. Magnus’ stomach is growling. Maybe he can get them something from Dimmu Burger on the way home.

Toki settles the box into the ground and murmurs something quiet in Norwegian. Magnus isn’t used to the sound. Toki’s voice is more fluid in his native tongue, fewer stops and starts.

“My dads couldn’t breathe. At the end.”

Whoa. Okay. We’re doing this, I guess, Magnus thinks. Deep personal secrets. Toki doesn’t like to talk about his family, but apparently he wants to _now_ , of all times. But Toki doesn’t say anything else, just fixes his gaze on the tiny dirt mound at the base of the tree.

Magnus considers for a moment, then takes a drag on his cigarette and crouches down next to him. Toki glances over at Magnus, and something in his eyes makes Magnus’ chest hurt.

“I hopes you ams not… mads at me. I know we was plannings to do a bunch of fun stuff.”

“You did a… a good thing today, Toki,” he says finally.

And then Toki’s hugging him, knocking him on his ass, and he awkwardly pats Toki on the back.

“There, there, kid,” he says. Toki’s hair is tickling his face.

“Nice of you to take pity on a rat.”


End file.
